WHERE'S THE REST OF HIM?

You could quibble, punch up the lead (a Johns Hopkins report has Iraqi civilian deaths surpassing 650,000), but this wins the year-in-review prize for tone alone:

Thousands of people died in the Iraqi civil war, which was costing the United States $100,000 a minute. U.S. forces began to negotiate with Sunni insurgents, and the Pentagon, short of buglers who can play taps at military funerals, ordered 700 automated digital bugles. Oil companies announced record profits; President George W. Bush said that America is "addicted to oil" and also asked Congress to pass laws outlawing human/animal hybrids. Scientists in Taiwan bred three glowing pigs. Samuel Alito was confirmed to the Supreme Court, and a study found that Antonin Scalia is the funniest of the Supreme Court justices. Robert Grenier, director of the CIA counter-terrorism center, was fired for opposing "excessive" interrogation techniques like waterboarding, and U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney shot and severely injured a fellow hunter while aiming at quail. Osama bin Laden released a tape in which he warned of new attacks on the United States; he also called on his followers to travel to Sudan and fight against the U.N. forces in Darfur. Al Qaeda members were communicating via social networking website MySpace.com, and the Taliban established a "mini-state" in Peshawar. Iran announced that it had successfully produced low-grade enriched uranium; to celebrate, men in traditional dress danced with uranium samples. U.S. senators insisted that attacking Iran must remain an option. "I can drink beer out of my leg," said Matthew Braddock, a 25-year-old National Guardsman who lost his left foot and nine inches of his left leg to a mine in northern Iraq. "How many people can do that?"...